Swedish court frees Aceh leaders

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A Swedish court has ordered the release of two exiled leaders of the Aceh rebel movement accused by Indonesia of staging assassinations, bombings and kidnappings.

Malik Mahmud, 64, and Zaini Abdullah, 63, were arrested Tuesday on suspicion of crimes violating international law. A third man - the 80-year-old titular leader of the Free Aceh Movement Hasan di Tiro, was not arrested, for health reasons.

However a district court in Huddinge, just south of Stockholm, today ordered Mahmud and Abdullah released from jail, rejecting a prosecution request for them to be retained pending a Swedish investigation.

Initial details of the ruling were not immediately available.

Indonesia's government claims all three leaders were behind a September 2000 blast at the Jakarta Stock Exchange that killed 15 people, as well as several other bombings, two assassinations, six arson attacks at schools and 243 kidnappings.

The Free Aceh Movement has denied the accusations, saying its actions are confined to Aceh, the province of 4.1 million people on the northern tip of Sumatra Island.

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All three arrested men are Swedish citizens and, as such, cannot be extradited.

The Acehnese have been fighting for independence on-and-off since the 1870s, when their homeland was invaded by Dutch troops and incorporated into their East Indies colony, which in 1945 gained independence as Indonesia.

The latest round of fighting began in 1976. More than 12,000 people have died in the Holland-sized province in the past decade.